This application includes, pursuant to 37 C.F.R. xc2xa7xc2xa71.77(c)(2), 1.96(b), a microfiche appendix consisting of four (4) sheets of microfiche containing 297 frames of a program listing embodying the present invention.
The present invention relates to interactive toys and, more particularly, to a very compact interactive toy that can perform movements with body parts thereof in a precisely controlled and coordinated manner in response to external sensed conditions.
One major challenge with toys in general is keeping a child interested in playing with the toy for more than a short period of time. To this end, toy dolls and animals have been developed that can talk and/or have moving body parts. The goal with these devices is to provide a plaything that appears to interact with the child when they play with the toy.
One serious drawback in prior art toys that attempted to provide life-like interaction for the child is the increased cost associated with the various components needed to simulate the functions necessary to provide the toy with life-like mannerisms. In this regard, the size of the toy also is an issue as it is generally true that the more the toy can do in terms of simulating life-like actions and speech, the greater the size of the toy to accommodate the electronics and mechanical linkages and motors utilized therein. Furthermore, and especially in regard to the mechanical construction thereof, the greater number of moving body parts and associated linkages and the greater number of motors also increases the likelihood of failures such as due to impacts. Such failures are unacceptable for children""s toys as they are prone to being dropped and knocked around, and thus must be reliable in terms of their ability to withstand impacts and pass drop tests to which they may be subjected. In addition, the use of several motors and associated linkages drives up the cost of the toy which is undesirable for high volume retail sales thereof. Accordingly, there is a need for an interactive toy that provides life-like interaction with the user that is of a compact size and which is reasonably priced for retail sale.
In addition to the above noted problems, another significant shortcoming with prior art toys is that even in those toys that include a lot of different moving part and significant electronics incorporated therewith, the movement of the parts tends to be less than life-like. More particularly, many prior interactive toys utilize a single direction motor that drives a control shaft or shafts and/or cams for rotation in one direction so that the movement of the parts controlled thereby repeat over and over to produce a cyclical action thereof. As is apparent, cyclical movement of toy parts does not produce part motions that appear to be life-like and consequently a child""s interest in the toy can wane very rapidly once they pick up on the predictable nature of the movement of the toy parts.
Thus, where prior art interactive toys have several moving parts, the life-like action attributed to these moving parts is due to the random nature of their movements with respect to each other as the individual parts tend to move in a predictable cyclic action; in other words, there is no control over the motion of a specific part individually on command in prior toys, and highly controlled coordination of one part with the movement of other parts is generally not done. For example, in a toy that has blinking eyes, cams can be used to cause the blinking. However, the blinking action does not occur in a precise, controlled manner, and instead occurs cyclically with the timing of the occurrence of the blink not being of significance in terms of the cam design. As would be expected, the focus of the design of the cams for parts such as the above-described blinking eyes is to simply make sure that all the parts that are moved thereby undergo the proper range of motion when the cam is driven. Thus, there is a need for an interactive toy that provides for more precisely controlled and coordinated movements between its various moving parts and allows for individual parts to be moved in a more realistic manner over the cyclic movement provided for parts in prior toys.
In accordance with the present invention, a very compact interactive toy is provided that provides highly life-like and intelligent seeming interaction with the user thereof. The toy can take the form of a small animal-like creature having a variety of moving body parts that have very precisely controlled and coordinated movements thereof so as to provide the toy with lifelike mannerisms. The toy utilizes sensors for detecting sensory inputs which dictate the movements of the body parts in response to the sensed inputs. The sensors also allow several of the toys to interact with each other, as will be described more fully hereinafter. The body parts are driven by a single motor which is relatively small in terms of its power requirements given the large number of different movements that it powers. In addition, the motor is reversible so that the body parts can be moved in a non-cyclic life-like manner.
More particularly, the drive system that powers the movement of the toy body parts, e.g. eye, mouth, ear and foot assemblies, in addition to the single small electric motor includes a single control shaft that mounts cam mechanisms associated with each body part for causing movement thereof when the motor is activated. The cam mechanisms include programmed cam surfaces so as to provide the body parts with precisely controlled movements. The programmed cam surfaces include active portions for generating the full range of movement of the associated body parts. Thus, when the motor is activated by the controller, it can cause the cam mechanisms to traverse the active portions of their cam surfaces for movement of the associated body parts. Every position on the programmed cam surfaces is significant to the controller in terms of causing the appropriate and desired movement of the body parts in response to the detected input from the toy sensors.
Further, because the motor is reversible, the control shaft can be rotated so as to cause a specific cam mechanism to traverse its programmed cam surface active portion and then cause back and forth rotations of the shaft for corresponding back and forth movements of the associated body part such as blinking of the eyes and/or opening and closing of the mouth and/or raising or lowering of the ears. In this manner, the body parts can be provided with a non-cyclic movement for making the toy to appear to be more life-like than prior toys that simply had unidirectional rotating shafts for cams of body parts which created repetitive and predictable motion thereof. In these prior toys that simply utilize a single directional motor for driving shafts and cams for repetitive cycling of body parts, the importance of the cam surfaces are minimized. On the other hand, in the present invention the cams have surfaces that are programmed for very precise and controlled movements of the body parts in particular ranges of shaft movements such that generally every point on a particular cam surface has meaning to the controller in terms of what type of movement the body part is undergoing and where it needs to be for its subsequent movement, or for when the body part is to remain stationary. In this manner, the controller can coordinate movements of the body parts to provide the toy with different states such as sleeping, waking or excited states. Further, the controller is provided with sound generating circuitry for generating words that complement the different states such as snoring in the sleeping state or various exclamations in the excited state.
As previously stated, the motor preferably is a very small, low power electric motor that is effective to drive all the different body parts of the toy for all of their movements while keeping the toy economical and minimizing its power requirements to provide acceptable battery life for the toy. Nevertheless, the small, low cost motor utilized with the toy herein still has to be precision controlled in terms of the position of the control shaft which rotates the cams of the body parts. In this regard, the present invention employs an optical counter assembly which counts intervals of the revolutions of an apertured gear wheel with the use of standard types of IR transmitters and receivers on either side thereof that are small components fixed in housings rigidly mounted inside the toy.
This is in contrast to closed-loop type servomotors that utilize a resistance potentiometer as a feedback sensor. The potentiometer wiper arm is a movable part that creates frictional resistance to motor shaft rotation. As such, the present optical counting assembly is advantageous in comparison thereto due to lesser power requirements as there is no frictional resistance created thereby. And further, the optical counting assembly is better able to withstand drop tests as the parts are all stationary and rigidly mounted in the toy versus the movable wiper arm.
In addition, the use of a single motor and single control shaft for operating all the cam mechanisms associated with each of the body parts allows the toy to be very compact and relatively inexpensive when considering the high degree of interactivity with the user that it provides. As there is only a single control shaft, a single small, reversible motor can be utilized. Further, the programmed surfaces of the cam mechanisms are preferably provided on the walls of slots with the cam mechanisms including followers that ride in the slots and that are unbiased such as by springs or the like to any particular position in the slots, such as found in prior toys. In this manner, there is no biasing force which the motor must overcome to provide the camming action between the follower and the slot walls thereby lessening power requirements for the motor and allowing a smaller motor to be utilized.
The toy also preferably includes a lower pivotal foot portion similarly operated by a cam mechanism off of the control shaft. The pivotal foot portion allows the toy to rock back and forth to give the appearance of dancing such as if this motion is caused to be repetitive. As previously discussed, the toy includes sensors, e.g. IR transmitters and receivers, for allowing communication between the toys. For instance, if several of the toys are placed in close proximity, and one detects a sensory input that the controller interprets as instructions to make the toy dance, e.g. four loud, sharp sounds in succession, the motor of the toy will be activated so that cam of the foot portion will be rotated by the control shaft to cause repetitive pivoting of the foot portion, or dancing of the toy. This toy will then signal the other proximate toys via the IR link to begin to dance. Other types of toy-toy interactions are also possible, e.g. conversations between toys, transmitting sickness apparent by sneezing between toys.
The toy herein is also capable of playing games with the user in a highly interactive and intelligent seeming manner. These games are implemented by specific predetermined inputs to the toy by the user that the toy can sense such as a predetermined pattern of the same action done a predetermined number of times or different actions in a specific sequence in response to output from the toy. For example, the toy can be taught to do tricks. Initially, a predetermined trick initiating sensor can be actuated to shift the toy into its trick learning mode. To teach it tricks, the same or another predetermined sensor can be actuated a predetermined number of times when the specific toy output, e.g. a predetermined sound such as a kiss, is generated by the toy. Thereafter, every time the trick initiating sensor is actuated for the trick learning mode and the toy generates the output that is desired to be taught, the same predetermined sensor must be actuated by the user the predetermined number of times which will thereby xe2x80x9cteachxe2x80x9d the toy to generate the desired output whenever the trick initiating sensor is actuated.
Another game is of the xe2x80x9cSimon Saysxe2x80x9d variety where the toy will provide a predetermined number of instructions for the user to perform in a predetermined pattern, e.g. xe2x80x9cpet, tickle, light, soundxe2x80x9d, which must be then performed with the toy providing a response to each action when done properly. If the user performs the first game pattern successfully, the toy will then continue on to the next pattern which can be the same pattern of actions that were performed in the prior pattern with one more action added thereto. In this manner, the toy herein provides a child with highly intelligent seeming interaction by allowing the child to play interactive games therewith which should keep them interested in playing with the toy for a longer period of time.
These and other advantages are realized with the described interactive plaything. The invention advantages may be best understood from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the accompanying microfiche appendix, appendix A and the drawings.